University Of Wisconsin Seniors Told They Can’t Walk During Graduation, Petition School To Play “Jump Around” Instead

Jared Borislow11 years ago

Walking across the stage at graduation is a time for celebration…and celebrating how bad some people are at backflips.

This celebration, however, is being stripped from the University of Wisconsin class of 2014–a pretty dick move by the university, considering these students have already had to endure three consecutive Rose Bowl losses, a Capital One Bowl loss, a Final Four loss, and, worst of all, having to live in the same town as me during their tenure as undergraduates.

Historically, Wisconsin’s graduating seniors have been separated into their respective colleges within the university for graduation. This allowed for smaller ceremonies, and thus gave students the ability to walk during graduation. This year, however, the university is mixing things up. Rather than having students graduate with their respective colleges, the entire senior class will graduate together in Camp Randall Stadium. While this will allow for the university to attract big name commencement speakers (this year’s is Jon Huntsman), the increased size means there is not enough time in the ceremony for students to walk.

This seems preposterous to me. I’ve seen the University of Minnesota manage to get tens of thousands of their students to walk and it only took them like fifteen minutes. Though, I guess I can’t really compare the two, as the Minnesota students are usually walking pretty fast since they’re trying to get out of the stadium early to beat the traffic.

The Wisco senior constituency is not happy. They have reason to be, though. How would you feel if you were being robbed of something you earned? I know that feeling, you guys, and it sucks. I had my “Most Likely To Die Alone” high school senior superlative stolen from me last year. That thing meant a lot to me. Yeah, it wasn’t an official senior superlative, and was given to me by some of the jocks as an act of bullying, but I don’t care. I earned that award. I deserved it.

Students are currently in the act of finding a middle ground. A petition has been started on Change.org to get the university to play “Jump Around” during this year’s spring commencement.

Regarded as one of the best traditions in college sports, “Jump Around” is a staple of Madison culture. If you’ve never seen it before, check it out:

From Change.org:

As graduating seniors, we can’t imagine a better way to come together for the last time than one final Jump Around at Camp Randall.
IF WE CAN’T WALK – WE DESERVE TO JUMP

The petition currently needs about 100 more signatures before…well, I don’t know what’s going to happen then. No clue how those petition things work. Not one bit. But I hope that this does happen.

The seniors deserve this. They deserve those 69 (TFM) seconds of school spirit. They deserve to have the best calf workout known to Badger. They deserve to jump around.

If they can’t walk, they deserve to jump.

[via Change.org]

Image via YouTube